Mrs. O'Leary's cow did it

Please someone tell me they understand the reference in my title. I like to think I'm pretty clever.

Alternate titles would be:
"They say lightning doesn't strike twice"
or
"Burnt Sasquatch"
or
Fire! Fire! Fire! Part 2
or
Seriously? I mean Seriously?

I had actually been planning a post to let everyone know that we've finally moved back into my house after the lightning fire back in October. I even took pictures of my new carpet, new walls, and new ceiling.

That post will have to wait while I tell you all about another fire we had.

Seriously.

Remember the Sasquatch?


As much as I'm not a fan of this truck, I'm terribly sad to say that I have a grumpy old neighbor who is even less of a fan of the truck.

As a result of his hatred...

The truck now looks like this.

Yes those were some large tools.

Yes, there was even a generator.

Yes, generators tend to explode when lit on fire.

Yes, it was a pretty impressive explosion.

My honey and I weren't actually home when this happened. We got there right as the fire department was leaving. (Sorry Barb, it was a different shift so I didn't get phone numbers for you, these guys were all a little older.)

We were able to watch the truck burn from the security camera's tape the next day.

The same security footage that show grumpy old neighbor man walking away from our truck as it is on fire.

The same grumpy old neighbor man who two days earlier yelled at my husband for the truck and said we couldn't park it there and he was going to have it towed.

The same grumpy old neighbor man who is secretary of my HOA and therefore the one with keys and access to the security videos.

The same grumpy old neighbor man who incriminated himself by showing us the security videos.

The same grumpy old neighbor man who has acted suspiciously guilty and told us the security videos couldn't "prove" that anyone lit the fire, but he recommends that we park it in the garage from now on because "Look what some one's done to it".

Nothing like welcoming us back to the neighborhood by setting our truck on fire.

Awesome.

Right of Passage

I've had another major milestone in my exceptional parenting adventure and I had to make sure I documented it properly.

Sophia's first visit to McDonald's play place.


Not only do I insist on the best nutrition for her growing body (aka french fries) but I excel at parenting as I find it's best to expose her to every known bacteria, germ, and infectious disease known to mankind(aka the play place).



Even after dipping her in a bath of anti-bacterial hand sanitizer, I'm pretty sure she only ended up with rabies, herpes, and possibly scabies - only I'm not really sure what that is.


I'd do anything for that adorable smile.

Which is probably why I've been nominated for mom of the year.

I'm working on my acceptance speech.

The girl loves to bathe

I haven't had enough nudity on my blog so I thought I'd offer up some classic bathtub shots of Sophia.


I only recently remembered that I'm going to want blackmail images at some point in the future.


Warning, images of a child bathing to come.


She gets really excited if she hears the water running and will crawl over to supervise.


In she goes!



She's in heaven!


And must try to drink as much bathwater as possible.



She takes after me in so many ways!

Valley of Fuego

We went camping this past weekend to the valley of fire.


I feel very uninspired to add any quirky commentary to these photos.


You can probably figure it out for yourself.


Here's all of us in our only group shot.



Sophia performing her death defying trick of cliff hanging. (Almost)



My MIL and the kids.


Dang this boy is so cute!

Perhaps my favorite picture of the whole trip. My honey and his brothers pulling their friend through the hole in the rock.

Our guest at dinner.

Pose for mommy.

My honey climbing through same hole in the rock.

Father and son.

Father and daughter

Well what-da-know, I came up with a caption for each picture after all.

I was behind the lense the whole time so that explains my lack of presence. I guess we'll have to go again so someone else can take the pictures.

Any takers?

Please don't call CPS

Her dad is the reason her nose lost the top layer of her epidermis.


Her mom is the reason she's smiling.

Just saying... I may or may not be her favorite.

Take a seat.

I was driving down the road and saw these 2 chairs just sitting there all abandoned like and sad looking.

So I made my honey stop and load them up.

He couldn't imagine why I would want them.

But I saw potential.


Even though they would need a lot of work.



I started by taking them all apart and sanding them down to the wood.

Did I mention I did this in the living room? My floor looked like this for 3 weeks or so until I finally moved this project out to the garage.


And enlisted help on the sanding part. Seriously, it takes forever!

Then everything was ready to prime and paint.

*** This was the part of the project I call "getting high"

I had to do something about that nasty fabric also so I started by ripping off the old stuff.

And I measured a new piece. (Notice the stain on the old seat fabric. Awesome)


And I stapled that baby all back together.

Ta da! My new chair. (The other one is still in the primer stage)

Scroll up in case you've forgotten how nasti-fied it was before.

I'm almost tempted to drive by the house that had this out on their curb and show them what they're missing.

Almost.

She's mobile

And she loves stairs! By the time I get around to buying a gate, she'll probably be 16. I've decided to just teach her how to go down and save a couple of bucks.

Dog gone it.

What would you do if you walked outside your front door to find this dog just hanging out?

Once I got over feeling like it was going to give me rabies, I called the number on the tag and nobody answered. So I stuck it in my backyard where it proceeded to eat dirty diapers and poop all over.

So we had a dog for a day while we tried to get in touch with the owners.

Turns out, it was the neighbor's dog. (Don't judge me, it's not technically my house so I shouldn't be expected to know the neighbors)

Then the owners finally showed up and took the dog back without even knocking on my door or saying thanks.


Ahem, you're welcome!

I'm tempted to throw the dog's poop over the wall.

Not very neighborly, but I'm probably not going to be in this house much longer since the repairs are almost complete on mine.